Dulip Prasanna Samaraweera (born 12 February 1972) is a former Sri Lankan

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er who played in seven

Test matches Test match in some sports refers to a sporting contest between national representative teams and may refer to: * Test cricket * Test match (indoor cricket) * Test match (rugby union) * Test match (rugby league) * Test match (association football) ...

and five

One Day International A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World C ...

s for his country from 1993 to 1995. He was a right-handed opening batsmen and occasional right arm off-spinner.

Family

His younger brother

Thilan Samaraweera Thilan Thusara Samaraweera ( si, තිලාන් සමරවීර; born 22 September 1976) is a former Sri Lankan international cricketer. Samaraweera played international cricket for Sri Lanka. Known as Sri Lanka's crisis man and for his sl ...

is also a former Test, ODI and T20I player of the Sri Lankan national cricket team. His brother in law

Bathiya Perera Wagawattage Maithree Bathiya Perera (born 28 April 1977) is a former Sri Lankan first class cricketer. A right-handed batsman and part-time leg break bowler, he has represented Sri Lanka A at international level. Perera impressed in the unde ...

is also a former first class cricketer of Sri Lanka.

Domestic career

Playing for the

Colts Cricket Club Colts Cricket Club is a first-class cricket team based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. They have won 6 first class tournaments of Sri Lanka domestic league as in 1991/92, 1999/2000, 2001/02, 2004/05, 2008/09 and 2011/12 and 2 Premier Limited Overs Tourn ...

in Sri Lanka, Samaraweera made his first class debut in the 1991-92 season. He made his

Twenty20 Twenty20 (T20) is a shortened game format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two teams have a single innin ...

debut on 17 August 2004, for Colts Cricket Club in the

2004 SLC Twenty20 Tournament The 2004 SLC Twenty20 Tournament is the 1st season of the official Twenty20 domestic cricket competition in Sri Lanka. 15 teams in total, five representing four provinces of Sri Lanka and a Sri Lanka Schools XI team participating in the competi ...

. He continued his first-class career for Colts until retiring in 2003. A strike rate of 53 in ODIs and 26 in Tests indicated that he was a dour player who did not score quickly. Although he never bowled at international level, he had 41 wickets to his name at first class level with an excellent average of 20. He scored over 7000 runs at first-class level including 16 centuries and 34 half centuries but never established himself at international level.

International career

He was selected for the ODI team for his debut against the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...

Sharjah Sharjah (; ar, ٱلشَّارقَة ', Gulf Arabic: ''aš-Šārja'') is the third-most populous city in the United Arab Emirates, after Dubai and Abu Dhabi, forming part of the Dubai-Sharjah-Ajman metropolitan area. Sharjah is the capital o ...

in November 1993, in which he only managed three runs. He played four more times, aggregating 91 runs and making his top-scoring of 49 in a successful run-chase against

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

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in early 1994. Despite top-scoring, he never played ODIs for Sri Lanka again. He made his Test debut against the West Indies at

Moratuwa Moratuwa ( si, මොරටුව, ta, மொறட்டுவை) is a large suburb of Colombo, on the southwestern coast of Sri Lanka, near Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia. It is situated on the Galle–Colombo (Galle road) main highway, south o ...

in December 1993, after replacing

Chandika Hathurusingha Upul Chandika Hathurusingha ( si, උපුල් චන්දික හතුරුසිංහ; born 13 September 1968) is a former cricketer. He was also the former head coach of the Sri Lanka national cricket team. Hathurusingha also worke ...

as an opener. He made a slow 16 from 107 balls on debut. He made his top score of 42 in his next Test against India in

Lucknow Lucknow (, ) is the capital and the largest city of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and it is also the second largest urban agglomeration in Uttar Pradesh. Lucknow is the administrative headquarters of the eponymous district and division ...

and played the whole India series, before touring New Zealand in early 1995 when he played his final two Test matches. He was dropped, ending his international career, in which he failed to pass 50 in any of his 14 innings.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Samaraweera, Dulip 1972 births Living people Alumni of Ananda College Sri Lanka Test cricketers Sri Lanka One Day International cricketers Sri Lankan cricketers Basnahira North cricketers Basnahira South cricketers Colts Cricket Club cricketers Place of birth missing (living people)